Bush lunches downtown, visits east Biloxi neighborhood

August 28, 2006

President George W. Bush spent time in Biloxi earlier today, lunching at The Schooner restaurant in downtown Biloxi before walking an east Biloxi neighborhood that he had visited days after Hurricane Katrina.

Bush was accompanied by his wife, Laura; Sen. Thad Cochran; Sen. Trent Lott and his wife, Tricia; and Gov. Haley Barbour and his wife, Marsha.

“All The Way Holloway,” Bush hollered as he stepped from his motorcade to greet Mayor A.J. Holloway and his wife, Macklyn, in an east Biloxi neighborhood about 2 this afternoon.

“How’s it feel to be 60?” Holloway replied, a reference to the President’s birthday months ago.

“You know how it feels,” the President quipped.

Holloway said the President had said he wanted to trace his steps from his visit days after Katrina last year.

“He stopped by the Patterson home off Howard Avenue in east Biloxi and stepped outside to speak with a group of residents in the neighborhood for about 20 minutes,” the mayor said. “He told me that he could see where we were making great progress and that he thought Biloxi was coming back strong. He also noted how just about all of the debris had been cleared and that he thought that was one of the most important things for us to do – to get rid of the debris – so we could move forward.”

To see background on the President’s visit, courtesy of the White House web site,click here.